


long-distance calls (leftover coffee grounds and pbj sandwiches do not a relationship make)

by Utopiste



Series: marvel femslash bingo 2020 [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: (if you want it to be), Angst and Humor, Canon Compliant, Carol is a Cool Mom, Character Study, F/F, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Prompt Fic, Prompts: Guilt I Sleep Deprivation I Nightmares, Stolen Moments, Wherein I talk a lot about coffee. Coffee is discussed. It's important., it's like half angsty character meta and half banter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-19
Updated: 2020-09-19
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:27:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26542162
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Utopiste/pseuds/Utopiste
Summary: Carol often calls at odd hours: if the time difference on another continent is enough to make Rhodey lose track from time to time, in space, Carol has given up entirely. And so Natasha winds up listening to Carol laugh as she dips her PBJ sandwich into a still-warm cup of coffee with a self-satisfied smile.“That’s disgusting,” Carol protests. “How dare you mess up a perfectly good sandwich like that.”“I think someone is just grumpy because they don’t have peanut butter in space.”OR: Four a.m. calls, crushes left unsaid, and learning how to be a person again.
Relationships: Carol Danvers/Natasha Romanov
Series: marvel femslash bingo 2020 [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1916707
Comments: 5
Kudos: 45





	long-distance calls (leftover coffee grounds and pbj sandwiches do not a relationship make)

**Author's Note:**

> The second contribution to the Marvel Femslash Bingo! Going way slower than I intended - I still blame the constant headaches. (Ugh, summer.)  
> The prompts I used this time were: Guilt, Nightmares, and Sleep Deprivation. Somehow, this is not as angsty as it sounds. It's set in the time jump between the beginning of Endgame and the actual plot of the movie.

> _“If we wore our hearts on our sleeves, we also wore a target on our hearts. Love would save us or kill us, probably both. Because the truth was, good guys lost as much as they won. And a sunrise never promised you a sunset.”_
> 
> The Mighty Captain Marvel (2017) #9

The French press is emptied out except for leftover coffee grounds, wet and gross, covering its bottom. Natasha wrinkles her nose at it. _Boys._

“At least it’s good to know Steve is still visiting,” she notes absently, even if nobody but her - as far as she knows - is in the compound today. 

For someone who has spent so much of her life working on turning herself as silent and deadly as possible - and, when not silent, carefully in control, intricate web of lies and half-truths - she finds herself thinking out loud more and more these days. Maybe all this empty space is messing with her head: after all, for all Natasha’s years on Earth, she has rarely ever been alone. She rarely ever had to make her own coffee, either. When she was a Widow, they had vile cafeteria coffee at breakfast. When she was at SHIELD, it was more of the same, with the occasional Starbucks. When Tony would live in the compound, they had an elaborate coffee machine with something like twenty buttons to push and more functionalities than the Iron Man armor. When they were on the run, well, there wasn’t really time to fill up coffee plungers, and if she needed a boost, she would simply have to ask their local bodega. 

But now she is alone in the compound, and she has to stay awake, and so she empties the remains of coffee inside the French press, washes it half-heartedly in the kitchen sink, dries it, and makes herself coffee again. While she waits for it to be ready, she jumps up on the counter and checks her phone - a couple of new messages from Rhodey about the shipwreck he narrowly avoided in Barcelona and if she heard of an up-and-coming criminal organization called Chaos. She types back something in the line of _seriously? chaos? because evil guys of villainy was already taken?_ and he answers gravely that _everyone’s got a gimmick now. we’re too old for this._

He’s right, of course, so Natasha makes herself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for good measure.

Rhodey probably didn’t realize it, what with the time difference in Spain, but it’s four in the morning here. Natasha doesn’t plan on sleeping.

Another night goes by.

Carol often calls at odd hours: if the time difference on another continent is enough to make Rhodey lose track from time to time, in space, Carol has given up entirely. And so she winds up listening to Carol laugh as she dips her PBJ sandwich into a still-warm cup of coffee with a self-satisfied smile. 

“That’s disgusting,” Carol protests. “How dare you mess up a perfectly good sandwich like that.”

"Come on. Didn't your kid ever do it? Not the coffee part, just the dumping PBJ sandwiches in warm liquids part."

"Maria and I raised Monica well, so no, she doesn't ever," Carol tells her. "Although now she is old enough to drink as much coffee as she wants. And trust me, she wants a lot of it."

Natasha’s lips keep smiling even while she chews as if they had a mind of their own, refusing to be tampered down the way Natasha has learned to through the years, blank expressions and carefully constructed smiles. She doesn’t blame Carol for it: this has been happening for a while, sometimes, being so full of affection she forgets herself, and if anyone is to be responsible for it it’s must be Clint and the other boys-

Thinking about Clint, though, is more depressing than it used to be, so instead, she swallows and says: “I think someone is just grumpy because they don’t have peanut butter in space.”

“Ugh. Don’t tell me about it.” Carol’s hologram flops down more than she sits, cross-legged on the floor with her knees unseen, poking out of the beam of light she is contained in. “The solar system I’m in doesn’t even have coffee - I tried to trade a Chiltarian for it, but then she turned out to be evil, and I fought her ship off, and we accidentally ripped out her cargo door, so.”

“Bye-bye caffeine.” Carol groans at that. Natasha wants to ruffle her hair - she takes another bite instead. “Was anyone hurt?” she asks with her mouth full, pretending disinterest.

“No, of course not, I’m a _professional._ Except for how I don’t get paid. Or have any formation.”

“If you were an official Avenger-” Natasha starts, but Carol rolls her eyes at her, and she chuckles before she stops there. “Just saying. Loads of empty rooms here.”

She just finished packing Vision’s room yesterday. It took her a whole month. By the end, his stuff fit into three neatly packaged boxes: mostly strange knickknacks he would notice in tiny shops in missions or that Wanda would give him so he could put them up on his shelf, a meditative and quiet like he always was even with his combination of miniature owl statues and earthenware. That, and spices he’d try out in food with varying levels of success. The Vision wasn’t a very material person. It’s not like he truly had a need for clothes, either, no matter the cashmere sweaters Pepper tried to throw at him. 

Natasha hasn’t even been in Wanda’s room yet. Only once did she glance inside it, back when it all came to an end and Natasha came back to the compound. She took one look at the guitar and remembered Wanda trying to learn from YouTube tutorials in her free time. The guitar was now lying down against the bed, drab. Empty cups still sat around with dried teabags inside, never taken away even in the couple of years Wanda had spent on the run with Steve and the rest. Natasha couldn’t bear the thought of being the one to wash them off. She closed the door that day and had not opened it again yet.

Loads of empty rooms to empty out, still. 

“How’s that going?” Carol asks her, voice gentler all of a sudden. It startles Natasha out of her own thoughts. 

She shrugs. “We’re not exactly looking at new applicants right now." It wasn't as if anyone wanted the job anyway. "Steve sleeps here from time to time, though.” 

Thor was in New Asgard and she only heard of him through the Valkyrie or when she blew up his phone enough that he absolutely had to answer (which was rich, since she gave him that phone in the first place). Nebula and Rocket spent most of their time in space, although they both slept here whenever they came around for a couple of weeks. When they saw each other, Okoye and her usually met in the city, sitting down at a Starbucks table while Okoye ordered a Pumpkin Spice Latte or a Caramel Macchiato or any drink they didn’t have in Wakanda. Rhodey was still an Avenger in function, but he had his own life outside of the compound - additionally, with Natasha staying in more often than not as mission control, he was often flying over to here or there on missions. 

Clint was still gone. 

Instead of explaining all this, Natasha adds: “He comes around often, actually. At least twice a week. But he is doing a lot of good at his support groups, and I think it’s good for him too. He needs to feel useful.”

“Unlike you, who is still awake at four because you just love to spend all day on the couch watching _The X-Files,”_ Carol deadpans.

Shit. Natasha did not think Carol had noticed the time. _“The X-Files,_ really? God, you’re old.”

“What? It’s a classic!” Carol frowns. “It’s still a classic, right?”

“Classic? Isn’t that old-people-talk for old?”

“You know, this old lady can kick your ass with both hands tied to her back, Romanoff.”

“I mean, you _will_ need to kick my ass hand-free when you’re leaning on a walker.”

“That’s it. I’m done with the disrespect,” Carol complains, leaning back on her elbows lazily. “I’m coming back to Earth. You can put your money where your mouth is and just fight me in the parking of the Lake Charles Waffle House when I get here at,” she looks at her wrist as if checking her watch, “two a.m. on Friday.”

“Which Waffle House?” Natasha asks, amused.

“You pick.” Carol yawns. “I’ve been to all of them. The Air Force was a wild time.”

“God bless the eighties.”

“And Scully.”

This is how Natasha falls asleep: after telling Carol about the tenth and eleventh seasons of _The X-Files_ and listening to her rant about not getting satellite television in space, her head falling slowly on her crossed arms on the oak desk, unnoticed. 

Like all mornings, Natasha wakes up with a start and a loud heartbeat. 

Like all mornings, she has to take a second to look around the room and count - five things she sees (dark wooden desk, empty coffee cup, potted plants on the shelf, drawing from Morgan on the wall, the blonde ends of her own hair), four things she can touch (the smooth desk, the texture of her fuzzy socks, the handle of her cup, the paper of files she fell asleep on), three things she can hear (buzz of the hologram not turned off on her end, birds outside the window, the washing machine tumble), two things she can smell (coffee grounds, home) and one thing she can taste (her own sleepy mouth - unpleasant).

She isn’t on Titan, and she isn’t on the run, and she isn’t being trained to be a Black Widow again; she isn’t in Sokovia and she isn’t fighting her best friend in an airport or in a helicarrier or anywhere, really. 

Sometimes the list goes otherwise: she isn’t in the Avengers Tower watching Tony and Bruce bicker like an old married couple, or in the early-days compound listening to Wanda and Vision flirt awkwardly, or in Clint’s house playing with the kids as he pesters her. 

She likes the nightmares better, though. At least waking up feels like a relief. 

“Oh, you’re up,” Carol says, walking back into the frame of the hologram. Natasha doesn’t startle because she is a trained assassin, but her eyelid does the barest movement. “That was short. You do know about the eight-hours-uninterrupted rule, right?”

“They have this in space, too?” Natasha asks while she rubs the heel of her palm against her eyes. “Trust me. If you were friends with the guys I’m friends with, you would also have given up on having eight hours of sleep long ago.”

There is a pause before Natasha opens her eyes again, and Carol is looking at her, really looking at her, with these honest brown eyes that come off as dark blue in the hologram hue. Natasha does her best to glare at her. Whatever Carol is about to say - probably something compassionate but no-bullshit - she doesn’t want to hear it.

“Nightmares, then, uh?” 

She shrugs, carefully nonchalant. “Who doesn’t have them, in our line of work?”

Carol chuckles a little, not very merry. “You have a point.”

“Yes, I often do.”

“I heard about that. Your reputation precedes you.” Beat. It’s coming now. “If you ever-”

“I’m fine,” Natasha cuts. Best to rip off the bandaid now. She smiles without showing any teeth. “Thank you for worrying, but I really am. We just- all need time.”

“And here I thought punching stuff solved everything,” Carol sighs. 

“I’m sorry, you must have thought you were calling the landline of one Steve Rogers, New York. You’re actually on the phone with Natasha Romanoff-”

“I know who I’m on the phone with. Jerk.”

Natasha shrugs. “Takes one to know one.”

“Well, I certainly didn’t beat the Kree with good cheer and my table manners.”

“I’ve seen you eat a burger in five seconds flat, Carol. You don’t have table manners.”

“I so do.”

“You wouldn’t know table manners if they hit you in the head with the flat end of a fork.”

“That’s oddly specific.”

“I’ve been babysitting superheroes for a long time. You don’t get this far in life while knowing Thor and Clint Barton by being soft on them.”

“I think you’re plenty soft,” Carol says, amused, while Natasha glares at her. She doesn’t even have the decency to look scared. “It’s still wild to me that you’re besties with a North god, though.”

“Yes,” Natasha deadpans. “I do have the immense privilege of being friends with the god of beer and three a.m. Fortnite games.”

“So basically a frat boy.”

“So basically, all the Avengers are basically frat boys.”

“Except you and Wanda?”

“Especially me and Wanda.”

Saying her name doesn’t even hurt as much.

Before they drop the call, Carol still reminds her she can talk to her if she ever needs to - unlikely - and that they can spar whenever Carol goes back to Earth, no powers, pinky swear - this is what only being friends with superpowered people gets you - and that if Natasha ever wants a space holiday, Carol’s ship has space for two. She could use a trained spy. 

The last one sounds more fun than the others, or maybe it’s just the way Carol looks when she is made of blue light, ethereal skin and cocky smiles. 

If Natasha doesn’t do this job, though, who will? She’s the only one left.

They keep up with the late phone calls, though. Sometimes Natasha falls asleep first; sometimes it’s Carol. Natasha suspects Carol’s issues aren’t all that different from her, in spite of all the bravado and nigh invulnerability. If you spend long enough in that line of work, you start seeing the same eyes in people. 

It’s pretty obvious when Carol won a battle - bright smiles and barbs and eye-rolls - or when she just lost one, sharp words dimmer and frowns that don’t quite let the sunrise go through. Truth is, the good guys lose just as much as they win. Natasha knows that from experience. When she was younger - so much younger, she thinks, even if Steve would scoff it off and ask what it makes him - when she was younger she believed it was as easy as wiping off a ledger. She thought of it like two sets of tallies on either side of a blackboard, one all deeds good and one all bad, neatly drawn in white on black. Now she knows - all the missions she failed at, all the collateral damage - they all crossed from one side to another. The only person who could have counted it all, memorized it and sorted it out, maybe, would have been the Vision, and he didn’t have much of an opportunity to do so now.

So Natasha doesn’t wonder how she will go down in History anymore. She tells herself she doesn’t mind. She looks at Carol, who is all things good and bright and heroic, sitting on the ground of her ship with eyes too bright when a rogue Kree squadron finds the shelter of refugees before she does to execute orders from Hala that were canceled decades ago. That were canceled decades ago, thanks to _her._ And sometimes it's still not enough. Natasha doesn’t think any of what they do will ever be enough, but she doesn’t think that’s what it is all about either. 

The _good guys_ lose as many fights as they win. The _good guys_ never know what fight to pick or how to pick it in a world like theirs, muddy with grey and red. Natasha hasn't made her peace with it. She doesn't even think any of them can, not really. 

So she keeps picking up Carol’s calls even when there is no mission to report. Sometimes they talk for hours on end and sometimes she shows alien kids how to braid their hair to keep them busy - Carol is transporting a group of them from their home planet, whose natural resources of plants and livestock ran on a delicate ecological balance that spilled over after the Blip until the entire planet starting dying, to a more hospitable place.

“When are you coming back to Earth next?” Natasha asks every once in a while - she is always careful to space these occasions out, so as not to seem too attached.

Carol has different shades of noncommittal answers - “Who knows?” “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m almost two galaxies away,” “I’m covering a lot of ground - what’s happening on Earth is happening everywhere,” “Not in time for the next Superbowl, I’m afraid,” “Why, do you need help babysitting?” - but only one honest one: 

“I don’t know. I’m not sure I even _can_ come back at that point. I want to say after this mission is over-” this mission is helping a ship of refugees whose captain faded to dust in the Blip find their way to their destination, a shelter on Praso-3 “-but we both know there’ll be a next one, and after that one-”

“It doesn’t end,” Natasha says. “I know.”

“Yeah.” Carol sighs. “I don’t know how Steve did it. Stopped, I mean.”

“I don’t know that he really did,” Natasha muses. “I think he found another way to do it. And I think- he’s tired.”

“Yeah, well, who isn’t. Hey, when’s the last time you slept?”

Natasha counts in her head. Something like forty-nine hours. “I took a power nap right before you called.”

Carol snorts. “Sure, Jan.”

“Is that- oh God, I hate that you know memes now.”

“Get on with the times, Tasha. I’m a _cool mom._ Don’t roll your eyes at me- I’m cool!”

“Yesterday I had to tell you that _Seinfeld_ stopped.”

“A cool mom wih taste.” There is a pause, as Natasha eats a bite of her salad - brought by Steve, of course, which is infuriating, because he’s not the one supposed to take care of her - and chews doubtfully. Carol doesn’t seem to notice, though, and switches topic to instead say: “For what it’s worth, I wish I could. Come to Earth soon, I mean. I miss-” she doesn’t finish that sentence and Natasha is grateful for it, instead picking: “I miss home.”

“Home misses you too.” Natasha gives a brave smile, but she’s afraid that in spite of her great skill at faking them, this one isn’t very convincing. 

They don't talk about what she almost said. This is what they can have - an almost-something, a maybe-one-day, not too heavy to navigate in this muddy grey world. As for later- Natasha can't even think about later now, can't begin to imagine it. 

But Carol misses home. Natasha does, too. 

Time drops slow and soothing like honey in a sore throat, months of long-distance calls and cough syrup, months of being interrupted in research and paperwork by Carol bouncing into the hologram frame - of regretting the vague alien blue of her shape so unlike the warmth of her eyes and her sun-bleached hair. They never talk about it - not Carol, and certainly not Natasha. She does realize if any of them was going to, it would be her; she can’t bring herself to wish for it. The tiredness that seeped into her through the years is bone-deep. One day, she thinks, Carol will be back on Earth, sitting at their breakfast table, and they will talk about it - one day when Natasha is a little less weary and a little more alive, one day when she doesn’t feel the need to carry the weight of saving the Earth on her shoulders and Carol doesn’t feel the need to carry the weight of saving the galaxy on hers. Maybe it is true what Steve repeats to his support group, that time heals all wounds. Mostly, though, she doesn’t quite believe it applies to them, not when the wounds are that deep.

But time is slow and soothing- until it is not. When Scott Lang arrives on their doorstep, everything speeds up, a movie back in motion after you paused it for too long, until Natasha doesn’t have time to warn Carol apart from the short, business-like message she sends all the heroes. She doesn’t have time as she is propelled into seeking out old friends, getting them in the same room together with a frankly ridiculous amount of coffee runs to Starbucks, letting them figure out time travel - and she does realize how ironic it is: _sorry I didn’t have time to pick up your calls, I was inventing time travel, so, you know, it won’t happen again_. 

Still she jumps in headfirst. 

She will have time to regret it later, maybe even have the luxury to apologize, so she smirks when she tells the others _see you in a minute._


End file.
